From the Margins to the Mainstream: Central and Eastern Europe’s Role in Exporting Cultural Populism and Challenging the Liberal International Order

This paper examines Central and Eastern Europe as a strategic incubator for global illiberal populist politics, focusing on Hungary under Viktor Orbán and Poland under the Law and Justice (PiS) government. We analyze how culturally radical agendas—particularly anti-abortion and anti-LGBT discourses—emerged as central themes in this region earlier than in Western illiberal populist movements, gaining political salience in the 2010s. We argue that these agendas, often framed in civilizational and sovereignty-based terms, have since migrated into the global right-wing populist repertoire, influencing political dynamics in settings as distant as the United States during Donald Trump’s second presidential campaign and Jair Bolsonaro’s Brazil. This diffusion illustrates how Central and Eastern European illiberal populists have played a formative role in reshaping ideological narratives that challenge the Liberal International Order. By promoting cultural sovereignty and rejecting liberal norms as foreign impositions, these actors contribute to an emerging transnational populist alignment that contests the foundational principles of liberal multilateralism, human rights, and global governance. The paper offers a regionally grounded yet internationally oriented analysis of how cultural politics and norm contestation fuel the current crisis of liberal internationalism.